Marigolds
by MarieQuiteContrarie
Summary: It's Rumple and Belle's wedding anniversary, and Rumple is celebrating another year alone. Stuck in Hyperion Heights with no way to join Belle in the afterlife, Rumple finds an unlikely confidante in his partner, Detective Rogers. Post 7x18, The Guardian.


A/N: This takes place the day after 7x18 The Guardian. I have never written a Rumple/Hook friendship before, nor have I written from Rogers/Hook's POV, but I like it.

"At least let me drive you home," Rogers says.

Rumplestiltskin glances at his watch with a self-conscious sigh. His partner's requests have turned into badgering. This marks the fifth time his partner has volunteered to escort him back to his apartment in the past 90 minutes—proof he must look as lousy as he feels.

Rogers' pity-filled eyes stray from the chessboard to the blue vase filled with flowers on the corner of his desk. The office air is thick with unspoken questions, but his partner doesn't ask and Rumple doesn't offer.

The flowers are for Belle.

In every realm they called home—whether in Storybrooke, the Dark Castle, or living out Belle's years together on the Edge of Realms—the two of them planted a huge garden filled with flowers. Roses, primarily, but also larkspur, snapdragon, bleeding hearts, and poppies. But Belle always insisted on planting marigolds adjacent to the vegetables.

Marigolds are an ugly flower in his estimation. Coarse and common, insistent on being everywhere at once, possessing a musky, pungent odor he finds repellent. Rather like himself.

"Marigolds never give up," Belle used to say, her hands covered in dirt. "They always hold their heads up high, even in the hottest part of summer. They attract the bees and protect the vegetables."

"They smell dreadful," he would contend, holding his nose in a theatrical flourish.

"I think they smell like sunshine." Belle would draw his hand away from his face and lay her head against his chest. "True beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

There was nothing he would refuse his wife, so as day followed night, marigolds they would plant. And after a time, he learned to tolerate the stubborn, garishly colored blooms, if only because their presence meant plump red tomatoes on their dinner table and radiant smiles on his wife's face.

So to celebrate their anniversary, he assembled a bouquet of roses, marigolds, and peonies at a flower stand this morning. Crimson roses to symbolize the fragile unfurling of their love; cream peonies in honor of their wedding day; and yellow marigolds because they flourish in any and all circumstances, much the way he thrived with Belle at his side.

Rogers gives him another meaningful glance, and Tilly feigns a yawn, stretching her arms above her head. The languid motion is debunked when she leans over the chessboard to snatch Rogers' rook with a gleeful laugh.

Rumple snorts. Two hours ago, they pulled a worn card table out of Rogers' office and started one of their spirited chess games two feet away from his desk. Should he have the notion to move around in this crackerjack box or gods forbid—leave the room—he'd have to trip over his unwelcome guests.

Instead he's staying planted in his desk chair. After Tilly tried to drag him to the bowling alley around the corner for some "quality time," he decided letting her and Rogers keep him company here was the less exhausting course of action. If there's one role he excels at, it's pretending, but there's no way in seven hells Rumplestiltskin will be seen wearing bowling shoes in Hyperion Heights or in any realm, even if he does have to wear jeans and fake a cockney accent. He still has _some_ pride.

Usually, Rogers and Tilly's easy banter and gentle ribbing puts a smile on his face. Tonight, however, all he wants is to send them home with a flick of his wrist.

But he won't. Magic got him into this mess in the first place.

It's been a scant twenty-four hours since the dagger went missing and he discovered it in Tilly's backpack. One short day since he learned that here in this world, even under a curse, she is still the Guardian. Yet—with more information and resources in the palm of his hand since he began his quest to be rid of the knife for good—he's never been farther away from Belle. Today he mourns her loss all over again, and being alone on their anniversary makes the everyday ache in his chest sharper, more acute. He presses a clenched fist against his heart, wondering if the hollow place Belle once filled with kisses and smiles and laughter will ever be whole again.

"C'mon, mate." Rogers jiggles his car keys. "You look like hell."

"How fortunate for us all that my ugliness doesn't stop me from operating a car," Rumple growls. He waves a hand over the Candy Killer paperwork littering his desk with a huff of disgust. "There's work to be done."

"You. Doing actual police work?" Rogers asks.

Both he and Tilly raise an identically-shaped eyebrow, and Rumple barks a humorless laugh. Like father like daughter.

"What's funny?" Tilly asks, the lines of tension in her face relaxing into a sunny smile.

"Other than Rogers' pathetic chess skills?" Rumple's lips twitch in a small smile, swamped with a fresh wave of regret for making Tilly worry. "At my advanced age, a great many things amuse me. But you two attempting to babysit me has to be near the top of the list."

"So you'll let me help you wrap the case, then?" the pirate-turned-cop asks.

'Who knew when you were assigned as my partner, I would be getting my very own Boy Scout." Rumple twists the pinky ring Belle gave him as a gift on their fifth anniversary round on his finger. The words on the pages of paperwork blur in front of his weary eyes, but he won't admit defeat. Not until he finds a loophole to trap Facilier. "You saved Henry and apprehended the Candy Killer. I'll take it from here."

After kidnapping Henry, Nick Branson, known as the Candy Killer, was brought into custody. Before they could begin questioning him, they found him dead in the interrogation room. No blood, no scratches, and the medical examiner reported that Nick was stabbed through the heart from inside his body. Only dark magic could accomplish such a task. Gothel, maybe? Or perhaps another member of her coven preempted Nick, afraid he would be released to strike again. The more likely culprit was Facilier, and the triangular pin Rumple found at the scene confirmed his suspicions.

But how can he explain what happened to Rogers, who is unaware of the double life they all lead? Should he say a powerful witch doctor used dark magic to murder Branson? He would drive him down the road to the insane asylum.

The truth is no use to him, anyway. He's out of options and short on allies. After he stole Regina's cure for Henry in his search for the dagger, she won't take his calls, and he's too ashamed to look at his grandson. Thank the gods Gideon is safe in another realm, even if he doesn't know where his papa is.

The least he can do is take care of Rogers and Tilly, the only two living souls in all the realms who are still speaking to him, even if neither one knows what he truly is. Once a monster, always a monster.

He drums his fingers on the table and rakes a hand through his hair. He needs to spin (if only he had his wheel,) and be alone. To think, to figure out this whole mess. Would Tilly and Rogers ever go home?

"We're just worried about you, Weaver." Tilly interprets his agitation as she licks powdered sugar off her fingertips.

Rumple rolls his eyes. With Tilly, worrying seems to involve games, books, and food.

An hour into their game, they ordered Chinese takeout and urged him to eat, but he couldn't force a single bite past his lips. He even refused to touch the beignets Sabine dropped off at the station in a not-so-subtle bid to impress Rogers.

He tried not to smirk when he accepted Sabine's little brown bag of sugary fried dough on Roger's behalf, but the blush on her cheeks and the way her bright, questioning eyes darted around the office made it clear she was looking for his tall, dark partner.

Rumple is no expert in love and attraction, but he remembers Belle's soft looks and tender smiles, and the way they never failed to turn his stomach inside out, leaving him breathless and out of his depth.

Besides, listening to Rogers stammer when he told him his sweetheart was looking for him was the best entertainment he'd had since Tilly got a job to support her marmalade habit.

If nothing else, Rogers and Tilly's lives are a pleasant distraction from his bleak, endless existence.

"I suppose this is your idea of heroism, sweetheart, saddling me with these two." He reaches for the vase to run his thumb over the head of a marigold, murmuring to Belle as though she is sitting next to him, just as she did every day of their seventy-year marriage. "Belle, I miss you. I wish you were here to tell me what to do next."

"Who are you talking to?" Rogers eyes him askance, and sends Tilly concerned glance number 572. Not that he's counting.

"Myself," he barks, hunching over the desk filled with paperwork to hide his flushed face. He didn't know he'd actually spoken to Belle out loud, but he's taken to doing it more and more in the weeks since the gunshot wound Tilly inflicted woke him from the curse.

He needs Belle here to protect him from himself. Old habits are creeping back in, desperation in the driver's seat. He fantasizes about using one of Facilier's pin cushions against him, or hurling a stake through Gothel's heart. It won't put an end to this damn curse, but it will make him feel a hell of a lot better.

Tilly clears her throat. "Weaver, you want some of this lo mein before I finish it off?" She holds out a set of clean chopsticks, fingers trembling.

"I'll pass, thanks." He offers her another fond smile to soften the gruffness of his refusal. "You eat it. You need your nourishment."

"'Kay." She shrugs and shovels a massive bite of noodles into her mouth, but since they found his dagger in her knapsack, she's been skittish, as though she's afraid he's going to lose his temper again.

Black ink drips down his fingers and he realizes he's crushed the pen in his hand. Somehow, he expected the road to redemption to be easier. When he thought the dagger had been stolen, the truth became clear: Every good deed has been done with the expectation of getting something in return.

Maybe Regina is right, and he hasn't changed a bit.

Disgusted with himself, he wipes his hands on a pile of Mr. Wong's carryout napkins and hurls them at the wastebasket.

"Every selfless act brings me closer to you, my love." He repeats his mantra in a ragged whisper, but after what he did yesterday, the words no longer hold any hope.

To punish himself, he stayed up all night, torturing himself with memories of sweeter wedding anniversaries. Long walks in the sunshine and picnics in the park; Gideon toddling into his mama's waiting arms; Belle perched at the end of a long table like a queen, surrounded by mountains of dusty, fat books; spending the entire day in bed making love just because they could.

Gods, how good life had been with his wife in the world. And what he wouldn't give for one more hour with his head in Belle's lap while she reads him a story and strokes his hair.

Tilly rocks back on the hind legs of her chair and squints at him, then snaps her attention back to the board. She rolls the white queen between her thumb and forefinger, considering her next move. Rogers is two moves away from checkmate, but Rumple knows he will misstep on purpose and draw the game out.

"We'll finish up later, then?" Tilly asks Rogers. "I've got to get to bed 'cause work starts bright and early. Sabine said she nearly doubled her sales the day after I passed out samples, and she wants me to do it again."

A flush creeps up Rogers' neck at another mention of Sabine, and Rumple grins in spite of his foul mood.

"The ones you brought into the station yesterday were gone in minutes," he praises. "Sabine is lucky to have you. She thinks you're a born saleswoman."

"No surprise they were eaten so fast," Tilly says, ducking her head in modesty. "Coppers and doughnuts, right? I tried to convince Sabine her beignets would be lovely dipped in marmalade. She liked the idea, but insisted on making some sort of rum sauce instead."

"Rum, eh?" He wonders if Rogers still has a fondness for the stuff under the curse. Pirates and rum; as synonymous in their old world as police officers and doughnuts are in this one. Rumple smothers his laughter, the sound coming out like a wheeze.

"Now why are you laughing?" Tilly asks, giving him a light punch on the shoulder.

"You, trying to convince your boss to add marmalade to her menu." The girl's weakness for citrus preserves was one of her more delightful quirks. The day they met in the Enchanted Forest, he'd come through the portal, weary and heartsick from losing Belle. She'd scolded him for upsetting her search for the white rabbit, then offered him a jam sandwich from her knapsack, insisting he share her lunch because he "looked like hell."

Some things haven't changed.

"Weaver?" Tilly clasps her hands behind her back and tilts her head. "I know you're missing _her_ , especially today, but are we...okay?"

He sighs. "It's like I told you last night by the troll, Tilly. I'm not angry with you; I'm angry with me."

"Please let Detective Rogers take you home," she whispers, laying a hand on his arm. "I'm afraid something else terrible will happen. You're a good man. I don't want you to be hurt." Her gaze wild, she looks around the shadowed station and shivers.

"Nothing's going to happen to me, dear." He struggles to swallow, touched by her concern. "How about I make you a deal. You promise to go straight home and lock the door, and I'll let Detective Rogers stay with me until I'm done working. Will that satisfy?"

"Thank you." She nods, her eyes shiny with tears, then puts on her coat and slips out into the night. He stands at the window with Rogers and watches her until she's out of sight.

xoxo

Rogers yanks a chair over to his desk and straddles it, all business the moment Tilly disappears. "What the hell is going on with you? I've never seen you like this."

Rumple doesn't look up from the desk, still littered with ink-splashed files. "Whatever do you mean, detective?"

"Scared—same as yesterday when you bit my bloody head off. Now you're hiding behind paperwork and skipping out to buy flowers. And since when have you worked by the book?"

"Since nothing else I've tried has been successful," he admits, looking up from the piles of paper.

"Whatever's going on, tell me. I can take it," Rogers says. "I'm your partner. We're supposed to help each other."

Rogers' concern fills him with an odd mixture of fury and affection. It's strange, yearning to be alone in his misery, but sharing his burdens holds appeal, too. Confiding in Tilly would be his preference, but the girl is fragile, especially after last night. He won't burden her with his pain.

"Would you care for tea?" he asks, resigned to playing host. He seems to remember Hook appreciating the beverage, or maybe that was the other version of him; the one who was back in Storybrooke and married to Emma Swan. "It's only bags, but it's tolerable. I don't have any rum, but there's whiskey if you need something stronger."

"Rum?" Rogers wrinkles his nose. "Never touch the stuff. Funny thing, ever since I moved to the Heights, people are constantly offering it to me. You'd think I was a pirate, instead of a cop."

"Indeed." He holds back a smile. Oddities in a curse were inevitable. Poor Rogers was in for quite a surprise when rum-loving Captain Hook woke up.

"Tea would be grand," Rogers says, nodding at the colorful bouquet on the corner of his desk. "Why the flowers?"

Rumple turns to the water filter to fill their teacups with hot water, grateful to occupy his hands with a menial task. "It's our wedding anniversary." He shrugs. "Those are her favorites."

"Will you tell me about her?" Rogers asks. "Your wife?"

"Belle. Her name is Belle." Settling behind the desk again, he slides a steaming mug toward Rogers, and wraps his hands around the chipped cup. He inhales the steam, taking solace in the smooth warmth of the porcelain.

Rogers smiles when he notices. "The cup you fixed. Her favorite, isn't it?"

He nods. Repairing their teacup had been worth every squirt of glue and weeks of sticky fingers. It's the only tangible reminder he has of Belle in this world, and he carries it between the police station and his apartment every single day.

"You mentioned you've been separated." Rogers gestures at the flowers."How? Does she live here in the Heights?"

Rumple winces. "The truth is complicated."

"It always is with you." Rogers sighs. "But you can trust me. I recognize when a man's trying to atone for something. Why aren't you together now? Was it divorce? Betrayal?"

"Nothing like that." He thinks back on shaking Hook's hand outside Alice's home, the day they'd agreed to start a new story. He wonders if the offer of friendship will still stand once the veil of the curse has been pulled back. "I'm a difficult man to love, but she always saw the best in me."

Rumplestiltskin adds a healthy dose of whiskey to both cups of tea. He misses drinking proper tea, the way Belle used to make it, but the other cops already give him strange looks for sipping out of a dainty porcelain cup with a large chip out of the rim. About once a week, someone deposits a new, oversized ceramic mug in the center of his desk, usually filled to the brim with coffee.

He dunks his teabag up and down in the hot water, then plucks the soggy bag out of the cup and sets it on a napkin on his desk, watching the brown liquid seep into the paper.

"I'm a father, too," he confesses. "Two wonderful sons."

Rogers gives him a blank look. "Congratulations. Where are your boys?"

"Gideon lives in another rea-..." Rumple clamps his mouth shut, saying too much for the second time in as many hours. He never figured the pirate for such a good confidante, but now that he's started talking, the words come quick and easy. "He's a scholar and a teacher. Moved to another country. I don't see him nearly as often as I would like, but it's enough to know he's safe. Gideon is our youngest. Our first son, Baelfire, he died a hero."

"War?" Rogers tsks in sympathy.

He inclines his head. Baelfire had spent years battling the darkness on his papa's behalf. "Of sorts."

Rogers takes a sip of the whiskey-laced tea. "I'm sorry. Losing a child...well, I can't imagine carrying such a burden."

Rumplestiltskin bites the inside of his cheek, oddly thankful once more for the ignorance of the curse. Not knowing Tilly is his daughter spares Rogers a bit of suffering. "I only wish I could have traded my life for Bae's," he says.

"I hope all fathers feel that way about their children," Rogers says with a smile. "But you must have a way to reunite with your Belle. A stubborn, resourceful bastard like you."

"I do. I did. But I've squandered my chances, done terrible things. Actions which can't be undone." With his head bowed, the truth he's avoided saying aloud comes out in a painful rush. "I took something valuable, and it cannot be replaced. Belle would be gravely disappointed in me."

"I've the feeling she would understand." Rogers drains his mug and Rumple pours another three fingers of whiskey into each cup. "Wasn't it you who told me there's always a chance to make things right?"

"Maybe for others, but not for me," he says, chagrined. "I've had more chances than anyone, and it's my turn to pay the price."

Rogers shakes his head. "I don't believe that at all. You may be rough around the edges, but you're one of the good guys. I feel it."

"Now you sound like my wife."

"Wise woman." Rogers leans forward, his face etched with curiosity. "What is she like?"

Emotion overwhelms him and he fights back tears. "Like no one I've ever known or could hope to know again. Fearless, intelligent, beautiful inside and out. Someone whose view of the world is so much larger than her place in it."

"Nothing like you, then." Rogers grins and tosses back his drink.

The laugh is sorely needed. "You're not wrong. Belle is a great deal too good for me. Much the way people ignore Tilly, nobody really saw her. They accepted what she offered: brains, extraordinary research capabilities, command of extinct languages, but they often took her for granted." He throws back another gulp of whiskey and gives them both another refill. "I've lost count of the ways she helped and supported and befriended people."

"Sounds like an extraordinary woman."

"Yes. You would like her, I think." Rumplestiltskin smiles sadly. Neither one of them has uttered the word _dead_ and he's grateful. It helps to talk about Belle in the present tense, as though she's still among the living. "Our relationship was at times tumultuous and controversial. I hurt her in terrible ways. But she always saw the best in me and she never gave up on showing me what kind of man she saw on the inside. Loving her, living by her side, having her goodness and kindness as my example. She changed my life."

"Anyone who loves someone the way you do Belle—you're her legacy, mate," Rogers says. "Even when you're not together, wherever you go, she goes, too."

He never figured on the pirate as a source of wisdom. "That's a pleasant thought."

"Do you have a photograph I can see?"

Rumple hesitates, reluctant to let go of the hard-won image even for a moment. This morning in the shower, after he over-steeped his tea and misplaced his handcuffs, he panicked because he couldn't recall the exact shade of blue of Belle's eyes. While the water poured over him he sobbed, hot tears flowing down the drain with the soap-tinged water. When he was supposed to be questioning a witness, he ransacked the evidence locker to find a picture of her. An object to hold onto.

With tender care he pulls out the creased, faded photograph he unearthed after three hours of searching boxes and files. It was autumn, a few days after Gideon's birthday. In the picture, they're sitting on the front porch of their house with suitcases packed, pots brimming with Belle's marigolds on either side. Their arms are linked, Belle's smile bright enough to rival the sun. "This was taken when we began our travels," he tells Rogers.

"She's beautiful," Rogers says, leaning across the desk to look down at the image. "What do you suppose it's like, the other side?"

"Tilly once told me it's a place where you forget about life's troubles and get to be with the people you love forever. Knowing my Belle, she's found herself a library." He can picture his wife, radiant and waiting for him in a garden bursting with roses, peonies, and marigolds, her pretty nose buried in a book.

Rumple stares at Belle's face long and hard, memorizing every nuance of her features, then pours another round of shots into the teacups. Some of the whiskey dribbles on the desk, and he frowns at the amber liquid, everything feeling hazy and dark. His eyes burn with tears. "I've gone on too long. I'm starting to forget her."

xoxo

Rogers switches off the desk lamp, then leans back in the chair to study his partner.

Weaver is snoring, his head cushioned by his arms, which are folded on top of the desk. Those sardonic, oddly ancient eyes are closed, the lines of his face relaxed in slumber. He didn't come out and say his wife was dead, but Rogers is a fair hand at reading between the lines. The loss explains so much about his partner, who wears grief like a suit of armor and swings between excessive caution and recklessness.

Weaver has talked of yearning to get back to Belle, and for the first time Rogers considers whether he might be on some sort of suicide mission.

He tries to puzzle out his partner's cryptic words and actions, but his head falls forward, his body craving sleep. He drank a good portion of whiskey and is too drunk to drive home. He reaches into his pocket for his phone tell Tilly he's running late, but a motion from the corner of his eye stops him. He drops the phone, his fingers crawling slowly toward his holster.

Shimmering light materializes from the shadows, at first formless, then gradually taking shape. It is a petite woman, and she has eyes only for Weaver. Powerful love shines in those soft, blue depths, and Rogers catches his breath, enthralled. No woman has ever looked at him the way this vision stares at his partner, and jealousy simmers in his chest.

Dark curls cascade down her back in a radiant curtain, and she wears a long skirt, a shirtwaist and a vest, clothing from a bygone era. At once he recognizes her from the worn, faded photograph. Weaver's wife.

She seems to float rather than walk out of the corner, coming up behind Weaver, her expression gentle and filled with the sort of adoration he has only imagined. Her arms wrap around him in a tender embrace, bathing him in the same shimmering golden light that surrounds her body.

Rogers' eyes prick with tears. It's an intimate moment between a husband and wife, one he shouldn't be watching, but he can't tear his eyes from such a precious sight. When the woman's bright, sharp gaze settles on him, he digs his nails into his palm. The pain tells him he's not dreaming.

"I was hoping you'd be awake," she murmurs near Weaver's ear.

She says the words more to herself than to her sleeping husband, but Rogers can't resist asking the obvious. "Why didn't you come when he was?"

Hands on her hips, she huffs in annoyance, glaring at him like an errant child. "You don't just appear whenever you want, you know. There are schedules. Waiting lists, Captain."

"It's Detective. And you're Belle," he says, then clamps his mouth shut. What's the protocol for talking to a ghost, anyway?

"That's right." Her brow wrinkles in a confused frown. "But you're not the Guardian." Her mouth doesn't open, but her words lodge in his brain, the voice a cultured female accent he can't quite place.

The look she gives him tells him he's a terrible disappointment, and he can't help but feel a twinge of hurt. Insulted by a ghost? Ridiculous.

"Guardian? He crosses his arms with a snort, strangely at ease considering who, or rather what, he's talking to. "As if he'd let anyone guard him from anything? He's a cranky, cantankerous old bastard."

She caresses Weaver with her eyes again. "I always have loved a good puzzle."

"You certainly married one," he retorts.

She levels him with a look, then her shoulders shake with gentle laughter. "What, you think I haven't heard that before? I'll be the first to admit my husband can be difficult. It did take me a little time to get to know him. You will, too."

"Suppose I am somewhat fond of the old man," he admits, pleased he'd managed to make her laugh. "Forgive me for staring, but it feels as though we've met before."

"Hmmm." She slips between his chair and the desk and hoists herself on it, crossing her legs at the ankles. According to those paranormal television shows, the temperature in a room drops when a ghost enters, but the air surrounding Weaver's Belle is warm, and smells faintly of sunshine and roses. "I knew someone like you once," she says.

"So this other bloke, he was handsome, charming, quick on the draw?" He attempts a wicked grin.

Again she laughs, a musical, delighted sound, then picks up the chipped teacup and takes a tentative sip. She coughs and sticks out her tongue. "Rumple has forgotten how to make tea, it seems."

Now it's his turn to laugh. "It's whiskey, love. Rumple? Is that what you call him?"

"Yes." She tilts her head, studying him, and he has the distinct feeling she can peer into his soul. Her smile widens when she notices the flowers on the desk, and she plucks a marigold from the vase, then runs it up and down her cheek with a contented sigh. "Are these for me? Today is our anniversary."

"Congratulations." An ache forms in the region of his heart, a longing for the love and connection these two extraordinary people share, even from beyond the grave. "You must have been happy together."

Her nod is eager. "We had many wonderful years, raised a son, traveled the world. But even with a lifetime of happiness, it's never quite enough. Long ago we promised each other forever. Soon he'll come home to me."

Fear clogs his throat at the certainty in her tone. "How-how do you know?"

"When you're awake, everything will become clear." She flashes another dazzling, dimpled smile.

"Awake? But I'm not…" He blinks, and Belle is behind the desk once more, leaning over Weaver to press a kiss to his cheek, then another to the top of his graying head. When she pulls back, a golden tear is leaking from beneath his closed eyelid.

Belle turns to him again. ""He's good man with a pure heart, but it's always been so hard for him to believe in himself. His journey hasn't been easy and his courage is faltering. But you can't solve this mystery without my husband. You need him. All of you do." Her eyes are narrowed toward him, as though she doubts his ability to do anything good at all. "Would you give him something for me when he wakes up?"

Without waiting for a reply, she presses something small, cool, and heavy into his hand. It's a gold ring, topped with a large moonstone.

"I'll see that he gets it." He slips the ring into his jacket pocket. "Can I ask you something in return?" His question should be about the Candy Killer case, or how Hyperion Heights came to be such a strange town, or why it seems however much he longs to travel, he can't bring himself to venture outside the city gates. Instead his thoughts are filled with Tilly and Sabine. "Will I ever have a great love? Like you?"

"You already do, Captain," she says, then she melts into the wall and fades out of view.

xoxo

"Rogers. Rogers, wake up." Weaver is standing over him, shaking his arm.

He blinks, and the dull grey walls of Weaver's office come into focus. The bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue on the desk is almost empty. Though his vision is still bleary, he can make out the outline of a flowing blue skirt and hear the echo of a woman's gentle laughter. Hard as he tries to capture the memory, it evaporates, like droplets of water on the sun-drenched deck of a ship.

"Where is it you said you're from?" he asks, wincing at the throbbing pain in his temples. His mouth tastes like plywood.

Weaver shoots him a quizzical look. "I didn't, but before I was with Seattle PD I lived in Maine."

He slips a cup of water under his nose, and Rogers drinks it in greedy gulps, the liquid cooling his burning throat. "And that's where you met Belle? In Maine?"

"One of the times," he mutters under his breath.

"Could you speak up, mate?" He pokes his ear with a finger.

"I said you should get home." Weaver says loudly, shrugging into a worn leather jacket. "Tilly will be worried."

"Not that loud," he grumbles. Rogers stands, the motion making him dizzy, and Weaver grabs his arm to steady him. "Seems I drank a bit too much of your whiskey," he says in apology.

"Sneaks up on you, doesn't it?" Weaver smiles. "Come on, I'll drive you."

Rogers squeezes the back of his neck and sways on his feet. He could have sworn his partner imbibed twice what he did. "You must have one hell of a tolerance, mate."

Placing one hand on the desk for balance, he fishes in his jacket pocket for his keys, but his fingers close around something hard and round. He pulls it from his pocket, holding it in his open palm. A moonstone ring.

Weaver's face drains of color when he sees the ring. "That's mine. Wherever did you…"

"I've no idea." Unthinking, he hands over the unusual gold piece. "It was in my pocket."

"Belle." The smile on Weaver's face transforms his features, and he touches his fingers to his cheek. He slips the ring onto his left hand as though it was made for his finger.

He doesn't know how or why, but something inexplicable has shifted between he and Weaver tonight, as though their lives are linked in ways they have yet to discover. For the first time he feels like he understands this man he calls a partner. Somehow they've become more than colleagues. They are friends.

"There's a diner round the corner from our flat," Rogers says, as they approach the office door. "Tilly and I go there sometimes for breakfast. Excellent marmalade, naturally. Meet us there tomorrow before our shift?"

Weaver nods, his footsteps lighter and happier than they've been in weeks. "I'd like that."

Rogers pats his pockets and turns around, realizing he left his keys behind. "Look," he says, motioning toward the desk. All the marigolds from the vase have disappeared, and only the roses and peonies remain. "Belle's flowers. It's...bloody magic."

"No," Weaver says, his voice soft and filled with awe. "It's true love."

###


End file.
